


i want you to notice when i'm not around

by kitnkabootle



Category: Succession (TV 2018)
Genre: Abduction, F/M, May/December Relationship, Older Woman/Younger Man
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-01-23 03:08:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21313183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitnkabootle/pseuds/kitnkabootle
Summary: Roman Roy has had some great ideas, and some terrible ones, but having Gerri abducted, might have been one of the worst.
Relationships: Gerri Kellman/Roman "Romulus" Roy
Comments: 67
Kudos: 127





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Well this was knocking around in my brain forcing itself to be written so it was. I'd like to continue it if anyone's up for seeing what happens next but leaving it where it is works too. Also I blame Roslin. For everything.

“Is she… mad?” Roman looks up at the two well-dressed, muscular men standing in front of him in the kitchen of his penthouse apartment. 

The taller of the two, the one with the gelled hair that makes him look like a Gotti teenager, is the first to answer. “Yeah, she’s pretty fucking mad.”

Shit. Roman feels his stomach twisting and he begins to pace the floor in front of the kitchen island, skipping his finger along the surface. “How… mad? I mean on a scale…” 

  
“Well, she was pretty calm when she got in the car. But when we tried to bring her up in the service elevator she lost her shit. She punched Carlos in the face and kicked the shit out of me. We didn’t really have a choice so we tied her up…”

“You tied her up?” Roman blanches, feels like every nerve ending in his whole body has been simultaneously lit on fire, “Gerri? You fucking tied her up?”

“What the fuck were we supposed to do?” Carlos answers this time, his eye partially closing where Gerri had hit him.

But Roman doesn’t give a shit about Carlos and his fucking eye. All he cares about is the fact that his cutesy little plan of surprising Gerri with a chivalrous display of affection has just gone to shit. “Fuck she’s going to kill me… she’s going to fucking kill me.”

“It’s not really my business but what did you think would happen? You know, abducting your dad’s lawyer?”

“Yeah it’s not your business. Not even a little bit your business,” Roman splits his fingers, pointing at both of them, “but for your information the plan would have worked perfectly if you idiots hadn’t acted like madcap Disney henchmen.” 

He crosses his arms over his chest, his leg shaking nervously, “Jesus. Tied her up?”

“Well just to a chair. I mean we didn’t hurt her or nothing.”

“Oh! Well, great. Totally fucking rad!” Roman makes an exaggerated dramatic cheer with his hand, “At least you didn’t fucking hurt her. Just scared the shit out of her. Fuck. Jesus, fucking Christ. No, that’s solid guys. Really great work.”

Roman rakes his fingers through his hair, nervously, then bites down on the corner of his fingernail while he thinks it out. A few quick moments of silence follow until he claps his hands together and looks up at the two men, “Wait, wait… this might. We can salvage this. How about you guys… like.. okay so you tell her, your boss or whatever, decided to let her go. Like… got the wrong middle aged milf or something?”

“You don’t think she’d land our asses in jail over that or anything? Attempting to abduct the General Counsel of Waystar? She’s seen our faces. No. We finished our part of the job, that’s it, we’re done.”

Roman swallows the lump in his throat and watches as the men leave, the door slamming shut behind them.

Great. Well now, all he has to do is go, fucking untie Gerri? Explain that this whole thing was just some kooky fun idea for date night? Drink some Glenfiddich, have a chuckle and lament the state of customer service these days? 

Amazing.

\--

The blast of cold winter air stung her cheeks and Gerri closed her coat tighter around her neck and adjusted her scarf to ward off the icy chill as she stepped out of the glass sanctuary of Waystar Royco. She hurried to the curb, keeping her head down, focused on the screen of her mobile as she always did to avoid catching the eye of wandering press looking for her comment on whatever latest Roy fiasco was gracing headlines. But the pavement was press free on this particular day, a testament to the type of frantic fixing that went on behind the scenes. Glancing up to where she expected her town car to be waiting — as it had been daily for roughly thirty years— she noticed an empty spot on the curb and scanned the street for signs of her driver. 

When she didn’t immediately spot him, she shifted her weight from heel to heel, her legs freezing beneath the thin sheath of hosiery, and dialed his number. As the phone rang tinnily in her ear, she thought of the bottle of scotch that awaited her at home. Perhaps instead she’d have a hot Toddy, a nice bubble bath, anything to put the cold of winter in New York and another day in the lion’s den behind her.

A black Cadillac Escalade pulled to a sudden stop in front of her, startling her and she stepped back away from the curb, accidentally cancelling the call in the process. 

“Fuck,” she muttered beneath her breath as she searched for the contact again, her blond hair whipping around her face from the push of the wind. 

A man circled around the front of the SUV, well-dressed with a friendly smile.

“Miss Kellman?”

Gerri looked up from her phone’s screen, though she didn’t acknowledge that one way or the other.

“Miss Kellman, my name is Eduardo Edwards from Crowne Luxury Private Transportation Services. George arranged for us to drive you home this evening. He’s having car troubles that have put him out of service.”

Gerri looked at the car and back towards the man, the bite of winter air speckling her skin with goose flesh growing worse with each passing second outside. Sighing softly, she nodded her head and reached for the door handle but Eduardo stopped her with a hand between her and the SUV.

“Allow me, Miss Kellman.”

He opened the door, drawing it backwards. She cleared her throat, slipped her phone into her purse and stepped into the back seat, settling her bags on the leather cushion next to her.

“Do you know the wa—“ she began to ask the driver but he closed the door between them with a solid thud. There was movement in the front seat then, a man sitting in the passenger seat who opened his door and got out. 

Gerri didn’t have time to wonder at the unusual situation before Eduardo opened the opposing back door and got in beside her. Simultaneously the other man had moved into the driver’s seat and she heard the stomach dropping sound of all four doors locking in unison.

“What is this—“

“Please remain calm Miss Kellman. You will not be harmed as long as you follow our instructions.”

Gerri chewed the inside of her cheek, her thoughts on her cell phone tucked away in her purse. When her finger twitched and she made the slightest move to reach for it, Eduardo caught her wrist in his rough hand.

“Let’s not make any moves either of us will regret.”

—

Roman stands in the elevator on the floor below his apartment, clicking the ‘open’ and ‘close’ door buttons repeatedly and watching the metal move as he figures out what he’s going to do.

He’d rented an empty apartment as part of the elaborate plan, a token of his fucked up affection that he hoped would have flattered her. Unfortunately, the sweetness factor has likely all but imploded and now he’s basically a kidnapper with a woman tied up in his shady rented space. He chews his cheek so much that he draws a little blood, the metallic taste of it enough to distract him. 

He’s in deep shit now. He knows this. Roman Roy: Eternal Fuck Up is at it again with this new latest release of _Lines and When not to Cross Them Part 2: The Streets_

He drags his fingernails down his arm, scratches incessantly at his wrist until small red welts rise along the surface. He checks his watch, takes a deep breath and finally exits the elevator, taking laughably small steps to the door of the apartment. He digs the key out of his pocket, unlocks it and turns the door handle, stepping inside. It’s freezing. Another small detail he probably should have thought of before putting the preposterous plan into motion. She probably thinks she’s at a fucking slaughterhouse in cold storage. 

He turns the thermostat up until the heat kicks in and he can hear it echoing down the halls of the enormous and silent apartment. He’s walking down the hallway, admiring the plushness of the carpet before he realizes he doesn’t have shoes on, another glaring indication he has no idea how to be an adult for five minutes. 

There’s a sound from the living area and he feels his heart pounding in his chest as he gets to the end of the hallway and peeks around the corner. His heart drops right out of his chest, through his stomach and shatters on the floor.

Gerri’s seated in a dining room chair, her wrists tied together around the back of it. She’s facing away from him, out the floor to ceiling windows reflecting the lights of the New York City skyline. He can tell that there’s something around her mouth, because it’s tied at the back of her blonde hair. Her shoes are haphazardly lying on the carpet away from her and when he looks beneath the chair, he can see that her stockinged ankles are bound.

Errantly he considers dipping out and calling Postmates while making a note to the driver to casually untie the woman in the apartment before delivering the pizza, but he knows his only choice now is to face her and try to explain why it is that he thought this was the next avenue of progression in their relationship -- if they even had a relationship or ever will again.

His palms are sweating as he steps towards her and the floor betrays him and creaks, signaling his presence. She straightens in the chair and he freezes where he is standing, wincing at what’s to come. 

Gerri tilts her chin towards him, ice blue eyes peering out from messed strands of blonde hair, a silk necktie separating her lips. She's bathed in the light of the city through the window and it reflects on the edge of her hazy eyes. When her gaze meet his, Roman feels all of the blood freezing within his veins, pumping thickly and slowly like cold molasses. 

“Uhh surprise?” he says, his hands lifting in a spirit-fingered wave.

Gerri’s eyes narrow, the ridge between her eyebrows deepening as her stare turns deadly.

And Roman, to his own shock and utter dismay, becomes grippingly, bone-crushingly, hard.

\---  


tbc


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I genuinely don't know what I'm doing? I just love them so much? Anyways, thanks for reading if you are I guess! I just want to live and breathe this pairing til the end of time, it's nothing really.

Roman feels hazy, like he’s coming off a week long bender. He scratches the back of his neck, not daring to meet Gerri’s eyes which he can feel like ice down the back of his shirt. He knows that he can’t keep her hostage forever, that he fucked up monumentally and now he’s going to have to live with the consequences. 

The apartment is dead quiet and all the lights are off inside. There’s nothing but the hum of the heat working to bring the temperature up and Roman thinks he can hear the subtle but steady tick of Gerri’s wristwatch.

He finally looks at her and finds she’s still watching him. The hardness in her eyes is present, but he also can see something else.  _ Disappointment _ , something he’s never seen reflected back at him in those familiar blue eyes. He’s done a lot of things over the years to make her scoff, roll her eyes, put him down, but he’s always felt in on the joke. Now it’s separate from him, she’s  _ separate _ from him. He’s never wanted to disappoint her and now that he has, it twists inside of him, black as ink, staining each vein and artery, something he can never erase. 

He doesn’t know how to express himself, or how to explain any of his intentions to her because everything sounds wrong inside his head.

_ I like you. I want to keep you close. _

_ You make me feel something when I’m with you. _

_ I want us to see each other, all the time. _

_ I want to breathe you, protect you, keep you here. _

_ I need you. _

None of it feels like anything she would want to hear. So he says nothing, closes the distance between them and reaches up, his hands pale, his fingers bony and clumsy as they work at the knotted fabric tied tightly at the back of her head. His fingers tremble, his palms slippery, his skin damp with nerves. He can’t get it to loosen, he pulls it upwards and it yanks at her hair, causing her to gasp sharply around the silk in her mouth.

“Sorry,” he whispers and can barely recognize his own voice, at how weak and distressed it sounds.

He gives up on the knot, worried that he’ll hurt her again and steps in front of her, surveying and weighing the other options. The rope at her ankles seems the easiest, so he lowers himself in front of her on his knees, and tentatively reaches around the base of her calves. When he works at the knot it loosens with much more ease, but there’s still a few tricky slips and ties that keep his fingers busy. His fingers inadvertently brush against her nylon stockings and he swallows, his cheeks bright red as he ignores the way it surges like a current to his groin. He hopes she doesn’t notice in the dark, can’t see the shame of it pressing hard against his jeans. He can’t stop it, can’t control it, but even he knows how beyond innapropriate of a reaction it is.

When he finally pulls the last loop free and the rope falls away, she moves her ankles apart and then together, one behind the other. There’s a run in one stocking and it leads his eyes upwards, over the curve of her knee where it disappears beneath the tweed skirt she’s wearing. Her wrists are bound behind the chair and he manages to get the outside knot untied enough to angle her hands nearer the side of the chair so that the light from the window illuminates them.

Apparently the Home Alone robbers he’d hired were both highly qualified eagle scouts on top of their killer skills in buffoonery. 

He takes her hands in his, sees the gold glint of the ring she’s wearing as it catches the lights from the city outside. His heart is racing at the intimacy of the contact. He’s never touched her before. It’s been an unspoken barrier, a line they never seemed to cross despite the fact that he’s ejaculated with nothing but a wooden door between them as he listened to the repetitive cadence of her voice just on the other side. Now their skin is touching, knuckle against finger, and it feels more intimate than anything else he's ever done.

He can’t resist looking up at her, gauging her reaction. Her expression is unreadable and she’s watching him, some of her hair having slipped free from the tie at her mouth and messily dangling near her cheek. His fingers twitch and he desperately wants to brush the hair back, to tuck it gently behind her ear, but he knows like everything else, he can’t.

He’s fucked himself so thoroughly with this situation that despite the way he works at untying the rope around her wrists, he knows this may be the last time they’re ever alone together. The accumulation of every phone call, every late night visit, every stolen conversation in hotel hallways and helicopters, all tossed on a table as an “All In” with no cards to back it up. 

He’s worried about what she’ll say. He’s terrified to hear the words in her own voice and to know that there’s little he can do to turn it all back around.

He can’t stall much longer, finds the ends of the rope and pulls it free and watches as she rubs at her wrists where it has roughed up her skin. His dark gaze follows her hands up as she unties the tie from behind her head - even in this situation, more skilled than he - and slips it free, her fingertips touching near her lips before smoothing back her hair. She reaches for her glasses at her feet and Roman helps her, picks them up and hands them to her. 

She takes them from him, stands and side steps around him, righting her shoes and slipping her feet inside, gaining several inches in height as she does so. 

“Your bag is-” he starts but she finds it before he tells her and he watches her slip her glasses back on and gather up her things, sliding her hand in her purse and retrieving her cell phone.

He’s still kneeling on the floor, still watching after her, as she disappears down the hallway having never looked back. He hears the door click closed - not even a slam - and then absolute silence. 

\---

He doesn’t hear from Gerri for weeks following the ‘incident’. He sends the occasional text, tries to call her, but eventually the calls start going straight to voicemail. He still sees her, of course, at every board meeting, in seemingly every hallway at Waystar Royco, and it occurs to him how ingrained she is in his life. 

She hasn’t told anyone what happened. He knows she’s too professional for that, but for once he wishes she would send out a company wide memo, _“Roman Roy is the world’s biggest idiot”_, or takes out a full page advertisement in The New York Times. He wants to see her get mad at him, scream at him, castrate him in front of his father, just some acknowledgement that he means anything to her, or that he ever did.

But her conversations are irreproachably professional, succinct. Nothing to give away that anything is amiss between them. That’s Gerri Kellman, everyone. General Counsel at Waystar Royco, dotting every ‘I’ and crossing every ‘T’ with nary a hair out of place. 

He tries to stop her when she’s heading out of a board meeting one day, but she offers him a false, polite smile and tells him her assistant will be glad to set up a meeting with the rest of the team whenever is convenient for him. Then he watches her walk away, followed by other board members, moving around him as they filter out to their various departments and offices.

\---

They’re at a charity fundraiser putting in an appearance to try and soften the company image of _Super Villains_, when he finally catches her alone for the first time since the debacle. 

He knows he could have texted her a full working apology, beyond short stunted sentences, but ever since Tom’s testimonial murder on the house floor, digital records of any kind seem a no-go. So rather than risk adding fuel to the fire, digging himself into deeper trouble with her, he’s been fruitlessly trying to catch her away from the others. 

When he sees her leave the man she’s speaking with to go into the lady’s room, he lingers outside as casually as he can, leaning his elbows on a table that’s much too low to be leaned on. He watches a young model float by, smiling over her shoulder at him as though she knows the effect she has on men. It’s lost on him. Still, he makes a show of tipping an imaginary hat to her, to at least pad his public persona of Roy Playboy.

It seems to take forever, but he finally sees the flash of blond upswept hair and the shimmer of a classically cut long dress and he knows that it’s her even before she looks up from her clutch. 

“Hey Mole Woman,” Roman grins and plucks a rose out of the flower arrangement on the table, making a show of smelling it before twisting off the stem and shoving it down in his suit pocket.

Gerri looks at him, sighs, and for the first time in weeks, there’s the barest hint of a smile at her lips, “Hey Rockstar,” she concedes; A gift.

“I was beginning to think you were avoiding me for some reason, completely unbeknownst to me and un-relating to that time I tried to kidnap you as a fun display of my affection.” Roman pulls another flower from the arrangement, flicking off the water from the stem.

She crosses to him, her voice low, eyes scanning the hallway that they’ve now found themselves alone in. “If you’re wondering if I’m still mad...”

“Well I mean, a complete stonewall from all personal conversations and having your calls and texts go unanswered and straight to voicemail… it does make a guy wonder.”

Gerri’s teeth nip her lower lip, and her voice is still conspiratorial and low, “Roman, I don’t know what you were thinking with a stunt like that, but I genuinely thought it was over for me. That I’d finally been taken out by one of Logan’s silencers, or fuck… _Antifa_… I don’t know.”

“Jesus, I’m sorry. I didn’t plan for it to happen like that.” Roman’s eyes are dark and serious and Gerri is standing very close.

“Why would you plan for it to happen at all? Roman, I’m not an object for you to move here or there however you please.”

Roman can smell her perfume, can see the freckles that faintly mark her skin beneath her face powder. He’s missed this, missed merely being in her presence and sharing the same space as her while the world around them spins along the edge of disaster.

“I just want to be with you,” he says without hesitation despite having never wanted to be so devastatingly real with anyone ever before.

He can see it startles her. Can see her eyelashes flutter, her gaze falter. For a split second it seems like she’s going to answer. Seems like there’s something new and unprepared waiting to fall off her tongue, but Gerri’s eyes flick past him and he can see an immediate physical change in her. The defenses go back up, the boardroom smile firming itself back into place and he turns around, knowing immediately that someone is joining them.

“Hey Gerri, Roman...” Tabitha smiles at them both, leaning in to kiss Roman’s cheek though he awkwardly dodges it. Tabitha doesn’t pay it much attention, “God I’m so late! I didn’t miss dinner did I?”

“Not yet, it should be starting soon.”

Gerri’s eyes flit between both of them and she opens her clutch and digs out her phone. “I have to make a call. You two enjoy your evening.” She smiles to them both and then presses the phone to her ear, making her way down the hallway away from them. The quick clip of her heels, and the sound of her voice, conversationally commanding even at a distance sends a shiver down Roman’s spine.

He watches her go and Tabitha has to take his arm and pull him away, before he remembers she’s standing there.

\---

Tabitha’s asleep beside him. The city light is filtering through the soft linen curtains and reflecting on her face in such a way that makes her look almost angelic. He knows that other men would kill to be in his shoes, to be laying in bed next to woman with her looks, her figure, her wanton straight up desire for all things cock. But he’s repulsed by it.

He fumbles for his phone on the nightstand and clicks on the most recent contact, typing in a quick message with his thumbs.

** _> That was a long call. You taking your phone skills public now? _ **

He doesn’t expect a response. Still, he refreshes his phone a few times just in case. When one doesn’t come, he opens a browser and googles, “Gerri Kellman”, then clicks on Images and begins to scroll through. There are many multiples of the classic headshots Gerri’s been required to take for marketing with Waystar Royco, and some random pap shots where she’s lingering in the background, a constant presence just over his dad’s shoulder.

He finds one of her in a courtroom, glasses perched nearer the end of her nose, ice blue eyes fixed on someone off camera, and he slows to a stop. His hand goes to the waistband of his briefs but Tabitha stirs beside him, startling him, and he quickly saves the photo to his phone and then drops it back on the nightstand. 

After a few minutes of stillness, he picks it up again and types a quick final message to her. 

** _> I want you to notice when I’m not around. And I want you to care about it._ **

_ When the phone beeps, it’s an hour later, but he’s still not asleep. His eyes are bleary and the light from the screen is blinding so it takes him a few seconds to see her response.  _

** _>I do._ **

\---

  
tbc


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a chapter ahead and I was going to hang on to this but what the hell. Tell me what works for you, what doesn't. Love to talk all things this pairing tbh.

They go to London together. The whole family. No one’s able to get out of it, except for Kendall who went rogue and is seemingly dead to them now. Still, Roman half-expects to see him standing at his dad’s right hand side when they get there, having spun his latest mutiny in such a way as to make him look like the motherfucking Roy Hero. But he’s not there and Roman actually finds he misses him. 

Gerri’s there of course and it’s the biggest fucking relief of all. Gerri’s a permanent fixture in all of their trips together. The lines of business and family have blurred over the years and Logan never seems to want to let Gerri out of his sight for too long. She’s the fixer, always has been, and if he had to put money on it, he would bet that she’ll be the last man standing when the company eventually implodes. 

_ Gerri Kellman, Waystar Royco’s finest. _

They still aren’t back to normal. Were they ever normal? It feels to Roman like there’s an alliance still, that he hasn’t totally lost everything he’s had with her, but things are definitely different.

He can’t pin her down, can’t spirit her away to talk to her without the prying eyes of the family. He tries to catch her gaze and he meets it once, but he can’t read her impassive expression. Stone cold killer bitch is back to play and she looks constantly busy and disinterested. 

Souring like Henry VIII, he takes to sulking over a brimming glass of whiskey. At twenty dollars a sip, it should be strong enough to distract his thoughts away from Waystar Royco’s general counsel but it doesn’t. She has a hold over him that he doesn’t understand and he’s not even sure that he wants to. When he thinks about her, he feels happy. He’s excited to talk to her, even more so when it’s in one of her various hotel rooms. He knows she listens to him, and understands him and he never really cared about it before but now it feels like he lives solely for it. Waystar Royco’s next COO? Who gives a shit?

In the evening he chances at which room is hers and knocks three times on the wooden door. Tom answers, looking exhausted and somewhat defeated, the way he’s looked since the yacht.

“Oh hey Rome. Do you need something?”

Roman is disappointed that it’s the wrong room but doesn’t let on. “Yeah do you have any blow?”

Tom opens the door wider and Shiv waves once from behind him. 

“I thought you were looking for another bathroom to jerk off in...” Tom offers and Roman flashes a fake smile. 

“Yeah but your mom’s not around is she?”

“No she’s not,” Tom answers thoughtfully, “but Gerri has the room at the end of the hall if that’s your key demographic....”

Roman feels a sudden fear clench his chest, like he’s been exposed and now everyone’s talking about it which will mean Gerri’s livid all over again with him. But Tom laughs and it’s clear it’s just another blind canon-fired barb that just happens to hit his battleship. 

“What’s your key demographic Tom? Yourself? Cut out the middleman and swallow right from the source?”

Tom’s smile fades and Shiv calls out from behind him “Go to bed Roman and fuck off.”

“Righto—“ Roman answers, saluting with one finger, “Toodle Pip!”

He starts off back to his room until Tom’s door slams shut, and he makes an immediate b-line to the end of the hall. 

His hands feel clammy and he’s nervous because ever since his piece-de-resistance fuck up, Gerri holds all of the power between them. Not that he ever held all that much power with her to begin with. He’s always looked up to her, respected her views, but he’s never felt he compared to her. The power he held was from being her boss and that wasn’t something he’d hard-won all himself. He’d been gifted it. 

She’s been an almost constant presence in his life although she never did seem to bond with any of the Roy children. Keeping her distance while being woven intrinsically into the fabric of his family — that’s a skill all of its own. 

He remembers jerking off to her when he was a teenager once, though he’ll never admit that to anyone else.

It was in Prague at some grandiose chateau his family had rented for the summer. He was upstairs in his bedroom, checking all the drawers for anything he could smoke or steal when he glanced out the window and saw her down by the swimming pool.

She was wearing a one piece swimsuit, her blond hair was longer then, half over one shoulder, half spilling down her back. He didn’t even know it was Gerri until she tilted her face towards the sun and the light caught her unmistakable blue eyes just visible over the edge of cat eye sunglasses.

Her husband had come up behind her then, circling her waist with his arms and nuzzling into her neck. He had whispered something into her ear and Roman remembers how she had turned around and grabbed the front of his shorts. Laird, Baird or whatever the fuck his name was — froze. Just one of her hands, skillfully placed, was enough to make him drop his own, white-knuckled, to his side. 

Roman was hard in seconds, his hand slipping into the front of his shorts as he pressed his forehead against the glass, watching them.

But then his father had appeared and Gerri’s hand dropped to her hip as she turned around, gliding down the steps into the pool. 

He remembers vividly watching her more closely after that. He wonders if that’s when it started. He’d revisited that fantasy often enough, putting himself in his sister’s godfather’s place. Fuck, when did it have to get this fucking complicated? He feels like he’s working out a family tree in Arkansas.

He runs his hand through his hair to slick it back and lifts and straightens the hem of his shirt before tapping at Gerri’s door. When it eventually creaks open, it’s just enough to reveal one of her eyes, her hair up, glasses on and the shoulder of what looks to be a silk dressing gown.

“Sorry, Kellman and Associates is closed. You’ll have to come back tomorrow during regular business hours.”

“Oh come on Gerri,” he actually whines and steps forward, wedging one of his feet in the doorway. She acquiesces fairly easily and steps back to allow him to come inside, then he watches her look down the hallway before closing the door. She turns around, leaning back against it as she looks at him, steady, calculating. She doesn’t say a word. 

“What’s going on with you? I’m trying to fucking talk to you and you’re treating me like the red-headed stepchild at the bah mitzvah.” Roman feels awkward without something in his hands so he goes to the desk and picks up her pearl necklace from the silver jewelry tray. 

When he looks back at her, her eyes are somewhat soft, perhaps a little sad. He pulls the pearls between his fingers and watches as she closes her silk robe tighter at her middle and takes a few steps closer, “What do you want me to say Roman?”

“Look I’m sorry Gerri, I know it was the world’s shittiest idea. It’s like my fucking rocket launch you know, it’s just,” he makes an explosion noise with his mouth and splays his fingers. “But I don’t accept that we can’t come back from that. We had a good thing going between the two of us, a rapport, you get me and I think I get you.”

Roman knows he probably looks pathetic at this point, coming to her room and begging to have things go back to normal but he also can’t help it. It’s the only thing he can think about anymore. 

“You know maybe that’s why you’re being so weird about this. Maybe you realize that finally someone understands you, better than the old boys club at the office, maybe better than anyone. Maybe that scares you, and I get it. But Jesus Gerri, I mean even if you don’t give a shit about me, shouldn’t you be securing our alliance, or some other revolutionary bullshit?” Roman feels like a child asking, feels dwarfed by Gerri’s presence. By the big fucking flashing red sign over his head that still screams he screwed up. 

“Do you want a fucking reward Roman? You swanning around, in and out of my hotel rooms, disrupting my life whenever it suits you to fulfil whatever fantasy Tabitha’s dropped the ball on?”

He feels indignant, wants to argue with her. Because of course that’s not it. Isn’t she listening? He struggles to find some kind of clever executive fuckery to hit her back but he knows he’s never shown her anything different than exactly what she’s laid out. He drops the pearls back on her desk. “That’s not what I mean.”

Her eyes harden and she takes a step towards him, “I don’t have time for your childish fucking playground games Roman. The future of Waystar Royco — your future — is what I’ve been concerned about and I’m trying to do my job here.”

It hurts him more than he expects it to, to be referred to as just another line-item on the nine to five to do list. It takes him a moment to recover, is preparing to fight back when her tone shifts.

“You’re just a little boy playing at being a grown man and you’re wasting my time.”

And suddenly it’s different. The hurt dissolves, and his skin prickles with the flash of desire her voice effortlessly ignites within him. There’s something in her eyes, in the way she speaks that lets him know they’re on the edge of playing his favorite game. Hell for all he knows, it might be her favorite game too. The anticipation she leaves lingering in the air between them, in her gaze locked to his, her hand on her hip, all of it makes him rock hard and he hopes she doesn’t notice despite it being pretty physically obvious. 

His shoulders slump forward and he looks up at her, his chin dipping to his chest, “I’m sorry Gerri, I—”

“You Roys are all walking disasters that I’ve put up with for years and you Roman Roy—” she pauses, merely a foot or two away from him, “you are the worst of them all.”

His fingers twitch and tighten as he looks down at her hands. Short well manicured fingernails, shiny clear polish, just as they were all of those years ago in Prague. He can almost feel her hand on him, stopping him, like she’d stopped her husband then, the recollection of the fantasy making it painful to be wearing jeans.

“Can I—?” He draws the last syllable out, his hands fiddling with his belt, waiting for her permission. 

“I don’t know know Roman, can you? Because if you can it’ll be the first thing you’ve done right this whole quarter…” She turns away from him and he watches the silk hem of her robe sway with her movement. He follows it up to the curve of her hip and further still to her blonde hair, held up by a pen — of all things — in a loose twist. 

His hands fumble with his buckle as he flashes back to the chateau where he first watched Gerri floating in the pool. Her blonde hair had framed her head like a Halo and her pale skin under the sun’s glow made her look saintly, which admittedly was not normally his thing. But he knew Gerri was no saint. Knew even at a young age that it was dangerous to cross her. Because even as she swayed softy in the pool water, her lips, painted a sultry devil’s red, it gave the suggestion that she might bite if you got too close. He had imagined those lips wrapped around him, her teeth drawing blood, and he had come so hard he knocked over a lamp and had to explain it to his father when the bill came. 

She’s still talking, even as her back is turned, her words hitting each point sharply, despite the way she speaks in whisper-soft decibels, “... I don’t know why I waste my time with you Roman. You’ll never amount to anything if all you can do is win a contest on who can ejaculate the fastest…”

As he slips the button on his jeans free, he stops and watches her. Remembers her hand on her husband’s shorts by the pool. Remembers him holding her from behind. 

He’s not sure what possesses him, but he makes another regretful move without stopping to think first. His palms are clammy as he works up the courage but her voice dripping with insults finally pushes him over the edge and he steps forward and takes her into his arms from behind. They don’t touch, they haven’t really touched, it’s a rule and he’s breaking it regardless of them never having talked it out. It’s another line in the sand.

His nose presses into the nape of her neck and he inhales immediately, the scent of her warm perfume is exhilarating. 

“What the fuck are you doing?”

He knows his dick is pushing against her now, that she should be able to feel it through the material of their clothes, and knowing that she might, makes him painfully hard.

“Uhhh.. I’m going to fuck you?” he whispers it against her skin - still a question because he doesn’t have the nerve to say it with any certainty. He touches the softness of her neck with his lower lip. 

It’s a quick movement but she slides out of her robe and away from him, the dark material slipping through his fingers and he clutches at it, holding it between his hands. His breathing is quick and ragged and he barely registers the black silky nightdress she’s wearing beneath. 

“I won’t be used as your mastabatory toy, Roman.” Gerri’s hair has come loose on one side, her eyes narrowed, her finger striking the air pointedly. 

“Use your hand, or that poor woman you call your girlfriend,” she says and opens the door to her room, staring him down.

He’s red-faced, unbalanced and suddenly unsure. Is it part of the game? Or is she really fucking serious.

“You’re not se--”

“I am. I don’t fuck children, Roman.” Gerri crosses her arms over her middle, and the seriousness of her voice is jarring. “Until you wise up and start thinking about your future and anything beyond your next source of instant gratification, I don’t even want to look at you.”

Roman stands unsteady, still clutching Gerri’s robe in his hands. 

He doesn’t remember leaving her room, the whole hallway a blur, but somehow he’s back in his bathroom, still holding Gerri’s robe.

He brings the silky material to his nose and inhales her perfume, slowly and steadily to try and calm down. But the scent of her sends a familiar jolt between his legs and he pulls himself free of his boxers and slips Gerri’s robe over his cock. It’s seconds before he’s sputtering his release over the fabric, staining it, ruining it, and all he can think of is how he’s going to work his hardest for Gerri and for Waystar. Even if it’s the only time he does something worthwhile in all his life.

\---


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for indulging my imagination and I so appreciate people taking the time to comment. It makes a gal feel good.

He doesn’t see Gerri at breakfast, or again at the estate. She takes an earlier flight out at Logan’s request to get a start on the latest disaster back in America. 

Roman stews over it. He’s in a mood when Tabitha joins him at breakfast. She rubs her hand in his hair, ruffling it and he tries to move away from her.

“Thanks Aunt Mildred, when did you get here?”

Tabitha rolls her eyes and sets her plate down next to him. She looks around the room, clearly noticing the absences. “Where are the shirts? Seems quiet this morning.” 

“I heard they had a killer orgy last night and Frank threw his back out boning Karl,” Roman grumpily spears his omelette with his fork. Even a joke at Karl and Frank’s expense can’t seem to lift his mood.

“Oh yeah?” Tabitha takes a bite of her toast point and grins at Roman. “Where’s Gerri? Did she break a hip pegging Frank?”

“That’s disgusting,” Roman snaps and he knows his anger is evident. There’s no laughing this off even though he’s supposed to. 

“Jesus Roman, what’s gotten into you this morning?”

Roman drops his silverware and pushes his plate away disinterested.

“I’m just sick of playing fucking house here with the family when obviously something’s going on back home if half the board is gone already. I should be over there with them. I’m supposed to be the COO.” 

“Well, maybe there’s nothing you can do. Maybe it’s just stuff they know how to handle.”

Roman stands, runs his hand down his hip as he paces around the table.

“Or maybe they're treating me like some idiot wallflower while they’re out there jiving on the dance floor with the cool kids and I’m over it. I have to talk to my dad, speed up this whole corporate procedural bullshit.”

Roman sighs, tucks the side of his shirt into his jeans — literally if not metaphorically pulling his big boy pants on — and stalks off.

——

He’s not great at talking to his father. They don’t speak the same language and often he feels like he’s playing parkour on the tops of skyscrapers — one wrong leap will have him plummeting to earth. But somehow he manages to convince the patriarch of the Roy family that he’s the company’s only chance at moving forward with a safety net. The corroboration of his own claims comes in the form of contact with an old friend of his, the daughter of a Russian oligarch, that agrees to consider taking Waystar Royco private — with less danger of overt terrorist meddling than the Eduard situation. It’s last ditch, sure, but it’s what they need to weather the Kendall shitstorm of 2019.

He receives a text from Gerri when news of the potential deal filters through the board, back home.

**> Good work, Rockstar.**

Roman flops down on the bed of his hotel suite in Moscow, a smile sliding across his face. For all the work the deal had amounted to - the high stakes game of corporate flirting - the pay off of Gerri’s recognition alone is enough to make it worthwhile

**>And to think you had so little faith, Mole Woman.**

He waits almost 10 seconds before adding a second message.

**> What are you wearing?**

He can see that Gerri’s answering him and he does some mental math to work out the time difference between Moscow and NYC. She’s 7 hours behind him. It’s the middle of the afternoon and she’s probably still at the office. 

**> You are so predictable. I’m wearing a pair of Minnie Mouse ears, overalls and a smile.**

Roman laughs at that thought, though he doesn’t need her to tell him that she’s likely in a dress suit of some kind. He doesn’t know that he’s seen her wear anything but a skirt or dress at the office and it’s likely not changed in the weeks since he’s been gone.

He has absolutely no self control, and she’s given an inch so he’s going to try to take a mile, and he calls her. After three rings he hears her voicemail and knows she’s likely seen that it was him and chosen not answer.

He calls again just to see if he can make her abandon whatever it is she’s doing but again she doesn’t answer and this time it goes straight to voicemail.

It’s a few seconds before he gets a text.

**>Busy trying to ensure your entire future. **

He taps the top of his phone

**> I believe with the Moscow deal, I’m ensuring yours.**

He’s purposefully trying to push her buttons now. He knows that the fact that she reached out to him, means that there’s a chance they could fall back into their familiar barbs and flirtations.

**>That’s awfully presumptuous.**

She’s going to make him work for it. So he nibbles the corner of his lip, thinks about it a minute before composing something he hopes will get her thinking if it accomplishes nothing else. Planting the seed and all that...

**> You know if I was there I could bend you over that table and show the board how great I am at getting results.**

It’s a chance taken, and the three dots showing she’s replying on the other end is enough to make his leg tap nervously. 

**>Do you think my obvious boredom would work for, or against you in that scenario? **

She’s taunting him, it’s their form of a signed permission slip, the beginning of the dance. He can feel it. 

**>You say that now but I bet you’re soaking through your overalls just thinking about it.**

Gerri’s response is quick, to the point and he’s aching from the excitement of it. 

**>Oh yes Roman nothing gets me off like a petulant school boy with a pencil dick.**

**>I’m holding it right now and it’s definitely more like a big stick of dynamite. Want to hear it explode?**

He imagines her in the room with him, lingering in the doorway, legs crossed at the ankle and a hand on her hip, looking down her nose through her glasses.

**>You’re disgusting and I have better things to do than listen to you ejaculate on the book jacket of Electric Circus.**

She knows that little sprinkling of humiliation is exactly what he needs and he’s quick to unfasten his belt and slip his hand in his briefs. With his spare hand, he presses on her contact again, and when he hears her voicemail greeting, his blood rushes to his prick like a Pavlovian response. 

He knows the message is recording so he lowers his phone to pick up the sound of his hand roughly sliding up and down himself. Knowing that she will hear his choked sob when he comes is enough to push him over the edge.

—

The deal goes through. By some sheer stroke of luck, Roman’s penchant for partying with the right mix of Russian Mafia Princesses and Columbian Drug Lords seems to pay off. Finally! 

He gets the text when he’s disembarking from the private plane. By the time the town car has him back in the heart of the city, he has a text from Gerri too.

**>Good job, Rome.**

Roman feels it like a caress, the ultimate reward for his efforts. Sure, he’s not done a whole lot in terms of actual business strategy here, but he’s managed to close without the help of daddy, and that’s a big fucking deal.

**>Thanks Mom <3**

He can’t resist. She ignores that unfortunate nickname in her response. 

**>Why don’t you come over and we’ll celebrate?**

With those simple words, Roman feels like he’s rushing down a hill without breaks. He looks at the back of the driver’s head.

“Yeah there’s a change of plans.” He doesn’t even remember where she lives, hasn’t ever been to her apartment, but she’s kind enough to drop a pin for him on the map in a text which he relays to the driver.

**>Sure, Ma. Be there in 20.**

**>Call me your mother again and I’m rescinding the invitation**.

He feels himself jumping at even the promise of what might await him at Gerri’s and he can’t stop his foot from tapping away with nervous energy.

It’s nearing midnight and he should be exhausted from his journey but he feels invigorated, like he’s about to be decorated like a damn champion show pony.

When he arrives at Gerri’s building on the upper east side, the doorman lets him in and activates the elevator for the penthouse. He checks the way he looks in the reflection of the elevator wall, raking his hands through his hair to straighten any unruliness, and tucking the flaps of his dress shirt into his dark jeans. 

He wants to impress her, of course, but he also doesn’t know what to expect. She’s never invited him over, never initiated any of their meetings, clandestine or not. He can’t count the number of times he’s knocked on a hotel room door, completely unexpected and likely unwanted. But now she’s calling the shots, and the shot is that she wants him - _ him _ \- to come over. The euphoric feeling of that propels him to the door of her apartment. He knocks on the white wood, looks around the small penthouse landing entryway. 

When the door opens, Gerri is standing on the other side, a wine glass between her fingers. She half-smirks, a little tease, and Roman leans on the wood of the door frame, absorbing it like sunlight.

“Well, well aren’t you looking proud of yourself?” Gerri takes a sip from her glass, turns it over on her tongue, studies him quietly, up and down. She’s wearing a black dress with long sleeves and her hair is down, framing her face. He’d like to think she chose the dress for him but he knows it’s much more likely she’s still wearing it from another day at the office.

“You have no idea. I’m thinking of buying a star for that sidewalk with all the dead celebrities,” he holds his hands aloft like he’s framing a marquee, “Roman Roy — Rock Star.”

She chuckles softly, turns away from him and leads him into the apartment. He looks around. It’s classic looking, all white washed and simple and expensive. It looks like a set, straight from that show about the two old lesbians living in a beach house. It’s not personalized in any way and yet it feels so perfectly Gerri. Removed, unassuming, no public statement, no comment at this time.

“Would you like a drink?”

“Yeah… uhh… whatever’s fine.”

She heads to a fairly extensive bar in one corner of the sitting room. Roman looks at the paintings on the wall, searches for photographs but doesn’t find anything. It occurs to him that her apartment looks like a hotel room, something that’s been assigned to her, rather than something she’s chosen. He wonders if that’s why she travels so easily with them all. Why she seems to be at home in whichever city they find themselves in.

“Looks like you have enough there to stock Bemelmans.” Roman leans on the bar top, nudges an empty crystal glass towards her. 

Gerri presses her lips together in a placating smile and pulls the stopper out of the decanter, tilting the deep amber liquid into his glass. 

Her fingertips brush his when she directs it back towards him and he feels it like a snap of static, an electric current he wasn’t expecting. The slight pinking of her cheeks is enough to expose that she felt something too but she clears her throat, lifts her own glass and takes a sip of her wine.

“You did really well Rome,” she says finally, her blue eyes drifting back to his. “The deal’s closed, crisis averted, and that’s all on you.”

Roman’s smile spreads behind the rim of his glass and he takes another sip, draining it before putting it back down on the bar. “I do what I can. Just a mere good deed doer in this world of chaos and uncertainty.”

Gerri refills his glass, “I’m serious. If you hadn’t come up with the plan to begin with, we’d be out of options if and likely when, things go further south with the Cruises fiasco.”

Roman nods, his knuckles gently rapping the counter. “I don’t know, I took a gamble, tried something I’m good at. I’m lucky it turned into something.”

“This is good for you, in your father’s eyes too. It puts you on the map, proves to him you have what it takes.”

Roman knows Gerri is right, feels the happiness in earning positive attention from his dad, but where he used to crave that kind of acceptance from him, he finds that now it’s Gerri’s opinion that matters more than anyone’s.

“And what do you think about it?” He dares to ask her directly, but can’t really look her in the eye as he waits for an answer. He looks down at the bar and arranges a few bottles so their labels point outwards.

Gerri doesn’t say anything at first and her silence draws a sideways glance from him, to make sure she heard, and that she’s listening. When he looks over at her, he meets her stare.

“I accused you of not giving a shit and you’ve proven me wrong.” She says it gently, a smile quirking at the corner of her lip, “I’m glad to see you exercising your potential, Roman. You should make a habit of it.”

Roman pushes himself up from the bar and walks a few steps, rubbing the back of his neck, “Uhhh I do have to apologize for something though…”

Gerri’s eyebrow arches, “I told you I’m over the whole… abduction thing, if that’s what you mean.” She wrinkles her nose and puts her wine glass down next to his.

“No I… uhh… your robe. I kind of, ruined it after that… our conversation in your room in London.”

Gerri looks confused at first but when he looks at her, really looks, all glitter and dark in the dim lighting on her sitting room, she appears to understand his meaning.

“I will say you have great taste in lingerie - it was La Perla.” Roman winks and sits on the arm of her sofa before slouching sideways over the back of it. He rests his chin in his hand and looks to her for a reaction.

“You should see the rest of my collection.” She drops that bit of information like it’s inconsequential, unimportant, like she’s just told him she collects Girl Scout badges or buttons. He tries not to think of backing Gerri against the floor to ceiling glass windows at Waystar, fumbling with her garters, exposing black lace.

Roman swallows hard, straightens on her sofa and drags a throw pillow over his lap. “Mrs. Robinson, you’re trying to seduce me.”

“Well this _ is _ a celebration and I’m feeling generous.”

“Oh,” Roman smirks wider, spreads his knees a little further apart and sinks lower into the sofa. “So does this mean I’m going to learn if the great Gerri Kellman prefers silk or egyptian cotton sheets?”

Gerri rolls her eyes, and walks past him, settling into the chair across from the sofa, one smooth nylon clad leg over the other. 

“Not that generous.”

Instead they spend the evening with Roman recounting the play by play of the Russia deal, Gerri leaning forward on her crossed leg, wine glass between her fingers and a delighted smile on her lips. When he ends up making her laugh, he marvels at the sight of it, like he can’t imagine anything more beautiful.

Then later, when Roman stands on the other side of Gerri’s door, his head canted to the side, cheekbone against the wooden frame, Gerri reaches up and strokes her fingertips along the stubble of his beard, down his throat where she straightens the askew collar of his shirt.

“I’m proud of you, Rome.” It’s whisper quiet and she’s looking at him intensely, her bottom lip tucking just gently behind the top.

She’s standing so close, her mouth less than a foot from his. It would be so easy to lean forward, to feel her lips against his, to taste her. He isn’t sure how less than a foot can feel longer than a mile as his thoughts become a minefield of self-doubt. 

_ What if she pulls back? What if he makes it weird? What if the game they play can only be a game in the context of the way they play it? What if none of that translates to anything more than a phone call, or locked behind a door. _

By the time he finds some semblance of bravado, it’s too late and Gerri’s closing the door with a soft ‘_ Goodnight _’, in punctuation to the sentence of their evening. The silence of the hall and the solitary chime of the elevator, merely the white of the page.

Alone in his apartment, he opens the photo folder on his phone and scrolls through until he finds the photo of Gerri in the courtroom. He pinches the screen, zooms in to her lips, her eyes, her fingers against her neck, buried beneath a swath of golden hair.

He lays the phone on the pillow beside him and Gerri's the last thing he sees as he drifts into the calm of a dreamless sleep.

\---


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you’re all still enjoying. Thanks again for your comments because they are so inspiring and wonderful. It’s very appreciated!

The weeks that follow are filled with board meetings and conference calls. He sees a lot of the office, a lot of Gerri, but the veil of work overshadows their personal lives and all their time in general. December seems to come out of nowhere and Roman only realizes that the holidays are approaching when his town car is driving by the Macy’s display windows that are bursting with red, green and gold, shining tableaus of capitalism and credit card debt.

He gets Gerri a present. It’s certainly an impulse buy as he’s passing by Cartier. His driver has to slam on his breaks by the time Roman requests the stop and as he’s stepping onto the sidewalk he glides along a patch of ice and practically falls into the security guard out front. 

He wanders around the store for a long time, looking at the different displays, leaving fingerprints on the glass that an employee has to follow him around cleaning up. He buys a string of sapphire stones set in rows of diamonds that reminds him of Gerri’s eyes. He checks the price tag to make sure that it’s expensive, that if she looks it up it’ll somehow show her how much he values what they have. That’s what his mom does anyways.

The problem is, he forgets if she celebrates Christmas. Forgets if she’s Jewish. Has she ever provided that kind of detail? Has he ever asked? He knows that despite knowing Gerri most of his life, he doesn’t really truly know much about her personal life. 

He knows what makes her laugh. Knows that she takes her coffee black, that she doesn’t eat breakfast and that she prefers silence in the car, over music. 

He thinks he’s waiting for the right time, if it ever comes, plans to give the necklace to her for New Years, maybe. Might not give it to her at all. It stays in the box for weeks, tucked away in a drawer and he forgets about it.

That is until he comes home to his apartment one night after a particularly daunting day, and sees it dangling around Tabitha’s neck. 

He becomes irrationally angry about it, demands that she take it off. She’s confused, and hurt and their words become sharp and combative, a barrage of “Mr Limp Dicks” and “Intrusive Bitch” hurled back and forth to the sounds of clattering chairs and clothes yanked off hangers and shoved into bags. She unfastens the necklace and throws it at his feet before finally slamming the door, for the very last time. 

Roman’s kind of grateful it happens the way it does. He’s wanted to break up with her for months, ever since the embarrassment of Tern Haven, but never had the balls to make it official. She was nicer to him than he deserved, that much he’s sure about. He even likes her as a person, wishes they could have stayed friends, but after the explosive way it ended it seems unlikely now.

He can’t give Gerri the necklace anymore. It just feels tainted by negativity, the dissolution of a relationship. He’s not really superstitious but he’s not taking chances either. 

He doesn’t expect to see Gerri over the holidays, because the old craggy patriarch has called the whole family together on pilgrimage to an estate in the English countryside. He knows it’s Logan’s way of ensuring his mother doesn’t get the entire holiday like she planned, to make sure she doesn’t in any way, win. Just another war they’ll all be fighting together, parents as battling nations and children, the expendable foot soldiers. He finds he mopes about it for the whole week leading up to the trip. 

Nonchalantly, he asks Gerri what she’s doing over the holidays and she just shrugs. 

“Hopefully a break from this,” she answers as she taps her Mont Blanc pen to the page of her journal, littered with hastily scribbled notations. 

But on the first day of their holiday, when they are boarding the private plane, he sees a familiar blond halo as Gerri steps out of the backseat of a black Bentley on the tarmac. He can feel his face lighting up, his whole mood skyrocketing as he bounds down the stairs, sidestepping Shiv and almost knocking Connor down along the way. 

“I knew you couldn’t bear to be apart from us!”

Gerri looks up, startled by the torrent of him rushing towards her. He can see her look around, scanning to see if anyone noticed, ready to play it however she has to. He doesn’t let it quell the excitement. 

“I just love putting out fires for the Roys at Christmastime.” She just barely shakes her head as she walks past him towards the stairs and he follows along behind. Without asking, he knows what’s happened. He knows that Logan’s perpetual worry about what’s coming next down the pipeline, wouldn’t allow him to be without his legal counsel for any significant amount of time. Knows that his dad feels safe when Gerri’s around. Hell, he feels it too.

They sit next to each other on the plane in the seldom used back room. It’s dark and the leather chairs recline far enough back to make sleeping actually possible. 

After dinner and drinks, he flicks around on his phone, texting the odd person, updating his social media, and when he looks at Gerri, he can see that she’s fallen asleep. Her phone is still in her hand, always on, always ready, even at forty thousand feet cruising altitude. 

He watches her for a minute. He looks at the fullness of her lips, watches her chest rise and fall in a slow gentle pattern, notes the way her eyelashes curl within several coats of mascara. After a few minutes he reaches up with both hands at either edge of her face, and slips her glasses off. He folds the arms closed and tucks them into her bag. Then he extends his index finger, tenderly and delicately, nudges it beneath a lock of her hair and drags it backwards to tuck it behind her ear.

Satisfied that he’s made her a little bit more comfortable, he pulls the collar of his jacket up around his face, crosses his arms and drifts to sleep himself. 

When he awakens, they’re on their descent into London. He glances at the seat beside him, sees it is distinctly Gerri-less, and then bends in his chair to look further down the aisle, where he can see her sitting next to Logan, glasses back on and fingers typing away into her phone. He knows that it’s just the start for her, that she’ll be working all through yet another of her holidays, just to ensure the future of their family company and for some reason that loyalty nags at him. He resents his father for years of taking advantage of her time, for the way the whole family - himself included - have expected her to clean up their collective messes, one after the other. 

He’s the last one to leave the plane after it lands, gathering up his coat and winding up his phone charger, when he sees Gerri’s Hermès scarf crumpled on the ground between the seats. He reaches for it, turns it over in his fingers and brings it to his nose. He’s glad no one sees him inhaling her fragrance, glad that no one’s there to see him tuck it away into the pocket of his coat.

The days are longer in the English countryside and Roman finds himself completely stir crazy and bored by the second day. Gerri’s hardly around, Logan having filled her time with work despite the holiday. He sees her at meal time, always angles for the seat next to her and is happy when she turns a smile in his direction, or tells him in hushed tones about some latest bit of company business.

His mother wins out at having the kids at her house on Christmas Eve and day and Roman dreads it from the minute he hears it. Knows that there won’t be reason for Gerri to come, that he’ll have to have an awkward dinner instead with mom and his maladjusted siblings. There has to be a joke about that somewhere. Four siblings walk into an estate; A power hungry head case, a moronic hippie, a coke fiend and a man-cub with mommy issues…

But there’s no punchline. Just the sad reality that Christmas is going to be lame and he won’t see Gerri for several days. 

He nips out of the house on the twenty third by himself and goes into London proper. He ambles around, mainly people watching, until he finds himself on Oxford Street at Selfridges. He fishes the Hermès scarf out of his bag and inhales the perfume still saturating the silk, before wandering through the fragrance aisle in search of a match. He’s frustrated when he can’t place it and it becomes an obsession. He takes the scarf to Harrods, to Marks and Spencer’s and Harvey Nichols. He can’t place it anywhere and over two hundred perfumes later, he chats with a counter girl and she suggests a perfumery called Floris. 

Finally, after making his way through half the bottle stops at Floris, he finds it. It’s like some kind of holy grail, like a light has shone down upon him, and the entire 12 hours he’s spent trying to find it, have not been in vain. He buys one bottle, but as the woman is boxing it up with fancy paper and ribbon, he adds a second bottle to his order. 

That night, in the guest suite of his mother’s estate, he sprays the pillow with Gerri’s perfume and lays face down against it. The remnants of that and the way the scent lingers on his clothes the next day is the only thing that gets him through another uncomfortable Roy family Christmas.

But even despite all that, despite keeping to himself and laying low, Christmas just gets him down. There’s Connor and Willa, Shiv and Tom, and mom and her latest love interest. Roger? George? In past years, Kendall’s always been around at family events but now that he hasn’t shown up to any since the turncoat incident, Roman finds himself the odd man out.

He calls Gerri on Christmas night.

“Has Scrooge McDuck given you the night off?” He’s laying down on the guest room bed, tossing a throw pillow upwards and catching it in succession.

He can hear an audible sigh on the other end. She sounds tired.

“Yeah, looks like he’s finally exhausted himself and has disappeared for the night so Frank and I went for drinks.”

“Frank?” Roman drops the pillow on the floor where it falls, forgotten.

“Yeah. The Fox and Firkin makes very strong martinis.”

“Oh yeah?” Roman knows he pouting, but he can’t help it. “Is he there now? Frank? Getting the after dinner special or—?”

“Roman what is this?” Gerri interrupts him, and he can tell she’s annoyed. 

“I just mean, when did you get to be such good friends with Frank? He almost threw you under the bus..”

“Frank and I have known each other for forty years. I think it’s safe to say we’ve both taken turns shoving each other off a ledge or two.” Roman can hear her pause and take a sip of something. “Besides how is it your business who I spend time with?”

“It’s not, I just… why don’t you ask me out for drinks like that? I can bet you I’m a thousand percent more entertaining than he is.”

“Roman,” she starts, and he can feel it low in her throat, a rumble of promise through the phone, “You’re behaving like a petulant child again and I’m not your fucking nanny.”

Roman’s tongue glides out to wet his lower lip, his head pressing back into the pillow, “Am I?” 

“You are.”

He feels the familiar prickle below his belt and listens for any sounds outside his door before slowly unbuckling his belt, “What… uhh… what would you do about that? If you were here?”

There’s silence on the other end of the phone and the sound of some shuffling before Gerri answers, “That depends. You know I did think of tying you to that fucking chair you had me tied to in that creepy apartment building. Strip off all your clothing, let you sit there facing all of New York City and think about what you’ve done.”

Roman’s stroking his hand up and down himself, her voice syrupy without the sweetness, conjuring so many vivid pictures in his mind that he has to struggle not to rush things.

“Oh yeah, would… would anyone see me?”

“Of course,” she answers. “I’d do it in broad daylight, call the whole executive floor over for a meeting right there in the kitchen.”

His hand squeezes tightly at the base of himself, trying to quell the quickly building sensation in his stomach. 

He’s breathless, when he answers “Would… would you do anything to me? Personally, I mean to uhh… punish me?”

Again there’s a pause and when Gerri speaks her voice has dropped lower, a deep whisper that caresses his ear, “You’re just a disgusting, worthless little freak Roman. You wouldn’t be able to handle a mature woman like me. I would rake you right across the fucking coals.”

He can’t stop himself, he’s cumming unpreparedly all over his shirt and pants, crying out into the phone and he knows Gerri can hear him which makes his release all the more satisfying.

“Don’t say I never gave you anything for Christmas,” she says finally, smugly, on the other end of the phone.

He can barely breathe, sags against the bed, overwhelmed by the smell of Gerri’s perfume still on his pillow. 

“I… have a present for you too you know.” He finally manages to say something, and half of it comes out as a moan.

“Oh and what’s that?” 

“Not telling, meet me at The Savoy tomorrow.” 

“Roman, I can’t make those kinds of plans. Your father will likely want—“

“Oh who cares what he wants? He takes up almost every waking minute of your life. Tell him you’re busy. Just meet me at The Savoy at Kasper’s at seven tomorrow night.”

He waits for awhile in silence, holding his hand up to the light and looking at the remnants of his release dotting the back of it. He can feel it wet on his stomach soaking through his shirt. 

“Alright Roman. Seven tomorrow.”

He finds some bravado and adds, “Wear some of that lingerie you were talking about.” 

“I always do.” 

Roman can hear her smile through the phone.

  
—-

  
  
  
  



End file.
